Trials of a Public Benefactor; As Illustrated in the Discovery of Etherization (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER II. BEGINS PROFESSIONAL CAREER HIS FIRST ATTEMPTS TO INDUCE ANAESTHESIA. " Men are fond of repeating that discoveries are most commonly the result of accident; we have seen reason to reject this opinion, since that preparation of thought by which the accident produces discovery is the most important of the conditions on which the successful event depends."? Wtimsell, History of the Inductive Saienees. Previous to the period to which we now refer, the art of dentistry had, but in rare instances, reached the dignity of a separate and respectable profession. Composing a part of the knowledge 'and duties of every medical practitioner, it was never expected that much relief would be afforded through their aid, except by the extraction of some troublesome and aching tooth, and the employment of such mechanical appliances as the press of a daily round of business and their low price allowed. Even in the larger towns, where constant demand had induced some to turn their attention to this as an especial study, but few were really competent and well-skilled men. Ignorant of everything appertaining to this branch except what could merely be acquired by them from their own experiments, without previous education, they did not hesitate unscrupulously to subject their unsuspecting victims to every mischance which their ignorance or hardihood might cause to happen. It is only necessary to quote, in support of this, from the mouth of a man who was fully able to pass an opinion. In an address delivered at Baltimore in the year 1840, by Dr. Chapin A. Harris, he says: " No credential or evidence of competency having been looked for or required, the profession has become crowded with individuals, ignorant alike of its theory and practice; and hence its CHAP. II.] DENTAL SUR...